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• Access and Technology Service

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• Education and learning
• Special needs and inclusion
• SEN and Inclusion Support services
• Support services available

• Access and Technology Service

Access and Technology Service

The Access and Technology Service is a team of teachers with specialist knowledge and skills in the use of information and communication technology (ICT) who help to enable children with special educational needs to communicate with others and access the curriculum.

What do we do?

We work with children, parents/carers, schools and other agencies to provide advice on the most appropriate ICT equipment. The children concerned have special educational needs and have difficulties such as:

• A physical disability
• Communication and language difficulties
• General development and learning difficulties
• Hearing and/or visual difficulties
• Difficulties in their emotional development.

How do we do it?

If school or nursery has concerns about your child and feels that special ICT equipment might be a way of helping them, they will discuss this with you and then may contact us for advice. When we first become involved we will usually:

• Talk with your child's teacher and look at your child's work
• Talk with the school's Special Needs Co-ordinator (SENCO)
• Talk with other staff involved in your child's education (eg teaching assistant, physiotherapist or speech therapist)
• Observe your child in school
• Carry out an assessment of your child using a range of ICT equipment
• Meet with you.

Following an initial assessment we may:

• Leave equipment in school with your child and his/her teachers for a trial period
• Advise on strategies for staff and parents/carers to work with your child
• Train staff to support your child with the equipment
• Monitor and evaluate the use of the equipment provided
• Trial new equipment
• Write a report giving the findings of our assessment and the recommendations on the use of any special equipment.
• Any records we keep about your child are confidential, but you can ask to look at the information we have with regard to your child.

What other specialist help is available?

The Education Service operates eleven other SEN and Inclusion Support Services. These services all work with schools and parents/carers to promote the educational, personal, social and emotional development of children and young people.

The other services are:

• Autism Support Service (for children/young people with a diagnosis of Autistic Spectrum Disorder)
• Education Access Service (for looked after children)
• Educational Psychology Service
• Education Welfare Service
• Hospital Education Service
• Learning and Behaviour Support Service (Primary)
• Learning and Behaviour Support Service (Secondary)
• Parent Partnership Service (for parents and carers of children with special educational needs).
• Pre-School Education Support Service
• Sensory Support Service (for Hearing and Vision)
• Speech and Language Support Service

How to contact us

You can contact us through your special educational needs co-ordinator (SENCO) in your child's nursery or playgroup. The SENCO will be able to discuss your child's difficulties with you, strategies that have been used to address them and the progress that has been made. Most of our work is planned with the SENCO.

Contact details